Following configurations are known for a conventional image capturing apparatus.
A square image is captured and converted into square digital image data, the square digital image data is trimmed horizontally and vertically in accordance with a state of a horizontal/vertical switching unit to thereby extract a partial region from the square digital image data, and the partial region of the square digital image data is recorded on an image memory. An example of such configuration is disclosed in JP-B2-2882391.
A first point and a second point are designated on an image of a subject to thereby set a trimming position so that a trimming range is set based on either of vertical and horizontal dimensions and an aspect ratio between the first and second points. An example of such configuration is disclosed in JP-B2-3372989.
In the technique disclosed in the publication JP-B2-2882391, since a partial region extracted by trimming a square digital image data vertically or horizontally is recorded on an image memory, it is however impossible to confirm in advance whether an image region desired by a user is contained in the extracted partial region or not. For this reason, an image containing the image region desired by the user may be unable to be stored because there is a possibility that the desired image region may be not contained in the extracted region.
On the other hand, in the technique disclosed in the publication JP-B2-3372989, it is possible to contain an image region desired by a user in a trimming range or record an image range having a shape desired by a user. It is however complicated to perform the operation of setting a trimming position by designating first and second points on an image of a subject at the time of image capturing, so that it is difficult to set an image range containing the image region desired by the user.